| Title | : | The Death of Jim Loney |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0140102914 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780140102918 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 192 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1979 |
The Death of Jim Loney Reviews
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Depressing as you'd expect but also oddly matter of fact in tone, which I liked. Almost black humor but not quite. Just humorous at odd times maybe. I liked that it didn't try to be more than it was but I also didn't like that it didn't try to be more than it was. As defeatist as the title character himself.
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Excellent story of a man painted into a corner. The prose is clean and tight and the characters are sharp and true. I will definitely be reading more of James Welch. Reminds me of a kind of Larry Brown of the American West.
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Can't believe it took me so long to read this book. Picked up a paperback of it at a library sale ten years ago because I liked the title and cover. Didn't know anything about Welch. A few years ago, Willy Vlautin named it as one of his favorite books in an interview and it jumped to the top of my to-read pile. Still held off for some reason. Since then, I've heard Jim Harrison and others talk about it. Found my old paperback this weekend when I was home for the holidays. Finally sat down and just tore through it. What a sad and beautiful little book. Seriously think it might be one of my favorite novels ever. I haven't felt like this since I read Ironweed at 18 and it switched my brain. It's almost assuredly not for everyone. If you like your books light and feathery, steer clear. But if you love tight prose and reading about tormented characters in a time of crisis, Loney's for you.
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“Ho davvero cercato di volere bene a Sandra, pensò, ma ora non ci riesco più. Non la conoscevo ed è impossibile amare qualcuno che non conosci. Si chiese se suo padre l’avesse amata; o se avesse amato sua madre. Mentre cercava di accendere un altro fiammifero per un’altra sigaretta, si accorse che gli tremavano le mani. Gli sarebbe piaciuto credere che tremassero per il freddo, ma capì senza pensarci che tremavano perché non c’era un vero amore nella sua vita; che in qualche modo, a un certo punto, tutto era andato terribilmente storto e, sebbene ciò riguardasse in parte la sua famiglia, riguardava totalmente lui.”
Jim Loney è solo, ha spesso lo sguardo assente, rivolto a sé stesso, estraneo a tutto ciò che lo circonda e con l’incolmabile necessità di ricostruire il suo passato che gli rende impossibile anche solo immaginare un presente e, meno che mai, un futuro.
Jim Loney è un mezzosangue, indiano da parte della madre che ha abbandonato lui e la famiglia quando Jim era molto piccolo. Forse è addirittura impazzita. La madre e Sandra, l’amante del padre che ha tentato di tirare su Jim e la sorella Kate quando se n’è andato anche il padre, appartengono a un passato consolatorio difficilmente accessibile. Le donne del presente di Jim, la sorella Kate e l’amante Rhea, potrebbero essere la sua salvezza a patto che accetti di recidere completamente i legami con il passato e la sua possibile identità di nativo americano, con i suoi simboli e luoghi, ai quali inconsciamente si aggrappa per resistere all’alienazione. Kate, che si è realizzata ben presto come donna ”bianca” di successo, e Rhea, immatura insegnante di origine texana e sua amante per breve tempo, sono entrambe estranee a quel luogo fisico e sociale nel Montana ai confini con il Canada, sia alla comunità bianca, che agli indiani della riserva; sono le uniche due persone che tentano di curarsi di lui e di strapparlo ad una inevitabile fine.
Jim è consapevole di non appartenere a nulla e che non ci sia nulla che gli possa appartenere, completamente estraneo anche al padre che lo ha abbandonato e che continua a incontrare pur avendo avuto con lui un solo, ultimo conclusivo contatto.
Non ci può essere una via d’uscita per Jim diversa dalla sconfitta, anche se con estrema lucidità e consapevolezza sarà lui a dettare le regole.
Nonostante la trama, non si tratta di un racconto cupo o, perlomeno, l’inesorabilità e la tristezza sono resi attraverso un tono piatto e pacato, una sorta di distacco partecipato, e la descrizione di un ambiente vasto e quasi desolato, che il lungo inverno restituisce con colori metallici.
È da sottolineare quanto la socialità sia rappresentata dai bar e dai loro gestori, che conoscono tutti e sono capaci di placare gli animi e di ascoltare, come ne Il racconto del barista di Ivan Doig con cui condivide lo stesso luogo della narrazione: Gros Ventre.
Mi sembra una buona lettura. -
The story is a modern American tragedy. Jim Loney is the product of a broken, alcoholic family. He is drinking himself to death. The slim novel reads like an elegiac cello solo plays.
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Too-soon-gone, Blackfeet author James Welch (1940-2003) frequently depicted the harsh reality of life on a reservation. Welch's novels can be terribly depressing, at the same time very honest in their portrayal.
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While the central character of this short novel, Jim Loney, is stricken with a loss of direction and purpose that suggests a death of the soul itself, the characters surrounding him are themselves unmoored and drifting in their own ways. Jim, cast adrift early in life as a throw-away child of an Indian mother and white father, believes that his life would take on meaning if only he knew more about his background. But being a "half-breed" merely deepens the confusion about his identity. His older sister, Kate, with a beltway job in Washington DC tries unsuccessfully to jump start his life, and partly as a result, begins to doubt that most Indians can be rescued from what amounts to a debilitating inertia.
Meanwhile, Jim's sometime girlfriend, Rhea, on the lam from an upper middle-class family in Dallas, has taken a teaching job in the northern Montana town of Harlem, where the story takes place, and abruptly quits in the middle of the school year to go back to Texas or to Seattle, she doesn't know where, and to do what, she isn't sure either. And a town cop, recently relocated from the Bay Area of California, decides after a bedding a few of the local women that small town life in the back of beyond is not to his liking. It is the late 1970s, in that period of post-Vietnam, pre-Reagan vagueness about national purpose and identity, and Jim Loney's lonely 35-year-old life settles sadly into an alcohol-soaked oblivion that drifts finally into an inevitable and violent ending.
Clearly and beautifully written, but without the humor in Welch's previous "Winter in the Blood," this novel is a melanchly portrayal of isolation and loss. And identifying with the central character, readers are likely to feel that they are watching a loved but frustratingly detached friend gradually slipping away. -
When I was a teenager I was an idiot. (I'm well aware many might say that I have changed little since then, but bear with me.) In an English class, I attempted to have Welch's Fools Crow banned from the school, mostly because I was lazy and too stupid to question my classmates.
I still don't think that Fool's Crow is brilliant. After reading The Death of Jim Loney I'm sure it's not brilliant, but this book is.
Set in the small towns of the Montana highline, reflecting the community and occasional desperation of life on the prairie it's a great introduction to contemporary Native American life.
Loney is tragic, though not a tragic hero. He is enticing, yet enfuriating, and his place in the Harlem community makes more sense the more you read. Though the ending becomes a tad too disjointed for my tastes, the complete description of a man, a culture, and a community makes it worth reading, especially if you're a good ol' country boy/girl. -
This is one of those strange books that I'm not sure whether I want to give 5 stars or 1 star. It took me a month to read it's less than 200 pages. It is not happy. There is barely one happy thought in this novel. It is stark and cold, like the weather in Harlem, Montana. But, all that being said, I cared about Jim Loney. I didn't want him to die, even though I knew he was going to and I figured out how the book was going to play out.
I have decided to read books by local authors in places where I am traveling. This was my first as a prep for our trip to Montana, and boy did it give you a feel feel for the landscape and culture there in the 70's. I'm glad I read it, but am also glad that I'll be going to a bit different sort of Montana. -
I read this book in college 29 years ago and I still think about it often. I love the way James Welch writes a story, it penetrates you in a way that the state of Montana does. You can’t stop thinking about the starkness of landscape and prose. Growing up in Montana I knew some of the people that populate this book. It was a very personal story to me but one that I recommend to anyone who would like to know what a deserted life looks like.
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This book is like the mafia. It draws you in slowly and once it’s got its hooks in you, there is no escape and you are marked for life.
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*listened to audio*
Good short listen for the road. Nice visiting Montana while in New York ;)
Has some Hunger Games prequel vibes. Heart wrenching, but would have to read it again to see if it actually touched the right spots. Not sure it did. Yet I didn't necessarily dislike the book.
I would definitely enjoy it more if I read it again.
A lot of mature content -
It's difficult to talk about books one reads when they correspond to the area of research that individual is involved heavily in. I picked up The Death of Jim Loney by James Welch on the recommendation of a mentor of mine and I knew, going in, that there would be a lot of times I would want to stop reading and start really diving into what I was reading and analyzing it and driving myself crazy with new research thoughts and ideas. But, about a chapter in, I put that part of my mind back into a box and I decided that I would give Jim Loney my full attention: as someone who was reading the book to listen to the story of this character.
Read the rest of this review at
The Lost Entwife. -
This book, originally published in 1979) was one of several Montana classics recommended for summer reading by a newspaper columnist. It portrays the hardscrabble life of a half-breed Indian named Jim Loney in a small remote Montana town. Loney is unable to connect emotionally connect either with his dysfunctional family who abandoned him in his childhood or a white school teacher who expressed affection for him. This is a short, but powerful, novel that captures the mood of the stark landscape of north central Montana.
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James Welch is the quintessential Montanan author -- hearty, crisp, cautious, clean -- much like roaming the great outdoors. You can view, hear and smell the scenes in his books, whether they're in the sticky bars or lonely houses or out in the middle of a chilly Montanan field -- his writing has that extra bit of magic that vivifies his scenes. Definitely not recommended for people who love happy endings.
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a great work of harsh lyricism by the great American Indian poet and novelist-
i first read it during a
heat wave and felt like i was freezing the whole time i read it-- -
My favorite book from my favorite Montana author. Great story about an indian man (native american) and how he changes his perception of life. Not for everyone. You will know by the first paragraph if you can handle this book.
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Emotionally devastating; sparse and direct; hard-hitting and unforgettable.
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Thirty-five-year old Jim Loney lives a solitary and brooding existence near the reservation in Harlem, Montana. Abandoned as a child by his Native American mother and his unreliable white father, Loney struggles with identity, with purpose, with alcoholism, with life itself. Even the love of Rhea, a Texas schoolteacher isn't enough to anchor or shelter Loney from the coming cold and the flutter of black wings.
The writing is sharp, the voice is true, and the loneliness never seems to end. For the most part the fragmented nature works, though I do admit that sometimes it left me out of step, though this might be a reflection, an empathetic mirroring of narrative event, or not. I like the fragmented approach as it allows room for the reader to turn inward. And there is room for this turning, too.
Most of the characters in this book aren't comfortable in their own skins, in their own lives, behind their own doors crowded by their own walls. There are characters on the move, there are characters trying to come home or to make home or to leave home, there are characters desperate for a reason, any reason, to keep swallowing the breath in their own mouths for a little while longer, anyway.
Look, no matter what I write, it won't be enough. I can talk themes, I can point to how it addresses the Native American experience and how it also correlates to post-Vietnam War America, I can... There's a lot here, there's a lot to unpack, and all of it is substantive.
James Welch was a Blackfeet author, and I will be reading more of his work. -
I guess this is what it's like to stumble upon a genius. I've fell deeply in love with James Welch's writing. The pure, unvarnished brutality, humanity, and tragedy all contained in three novels I've read so far (he only has five) has left me in a state of relative awe. The depth of his writing is inspiring, the way he rarely delves into unimportant details, but still builds a mood, atmosphere, and character to the level of any of the other writer's I love. This feels like a Shakespearean tragedy set in rural Montana with some thematic elements (being biracial) similar to Faulkner's Light in August.
James Welch isn't the most obscure writer in the world, but he certainly isn't recognized as readily as I would prefer. He creates characters that are both likable and unlikable, mean and kind, cruel and warm. He gives a voice (especially for the time) to a people that had essentially no voice. Jim Loney is a story of the tragedy and cruelty of America, both in the story and the titular character. He cannot function, he cannot breathe, he'd prefer to rot. -
Earlier this year I was up on the Hi-Line in Montana doing some book events of my own and knew I'd be there for a few days, so I took Jim Welch with me in the form of this book ... a battered old mass market edition with a funky cover of the sort I love. What's to say about it? Welch captures this world so well because he knows it, he's lived it. It is a sad story, but life is hard and often feels hopeless up on the Hi-Line. I like to think Welch's work made life a little better for a lot of people. That's the purpose of all of us who create from unrepresented people, to let everyone see themselves in works of art. Why else do it? Maybe I'm just rambling, but being of a "half-breed" people—the Métis—myself, I understand where this is coming from. I see much of myself in Jim Loney.
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A perceptive study of mixed-race angst, alienation and loneliness from one of the founders of the Native American Renaissance. Brings to mind Faulkner's Light in August and his character Joe Christmas, which is a longer, more complex work. Loney is a man suffering from a broken family and identity problems. The writing is taut and the characters well developed. But ultimately the reading is underwhelming and a downer.
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A sad, touching, hard-to-forget novel. Jim is ½ native American and ½ white. He never knew his mother, a native American who left when he was 2. He was raised by his father until he was 8 and then abandoned together with his older sister. He lived with an “aunt” and a “preacher” but he never developed a clear sense of who he is and where he belongs. He can't return the love of his sister or his girlfriend; he just smokes cigarettes and gets drunk. A sad, fascinating portrait.
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A beautiful and sad story; the journey of Jim Loney to his past, to underst his memeories, andftofind answers to why the mother left and why the father didn't aknowledge him and his sister?
the few almost glorious moments of a life in a little town, the interrogations, the love, the quest to truth and peace.
a very melancholic atmosphere which remainded me of "John l'enfer" by Didier Lecoin 's one. -
I honestly didn’t think I would like this book. However, the writing was very captivating, and it turned out that I liked it a lot. It wasn’t a story that gave you a warm feeling. It was quite the opposite. I felt sorry for Jim Loney, as he started to become mentally unstable. Then, when he shot his friend. After that it spirals into just tragedy. I did, however, find it easy to read and it was a good story. It might not have been a warm feeling story, but it was a good story.
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Covers the same bleak terrain as Winter in the Blood, and what terrain it is. Welch excels at crafting tight tales about lonesome who, in spite of the best efforts of the women in their lives, end up self-immolating. There's a reason subsequent generations of native writers (Tommy Orange, Louise Erdrich) adore his fiction.
Don Lee's profile of the Blackfeet and Gros Ventre legend:
https://www.pshares.org/issues/spring...
